Hello, All. I'm new to this website, and I've been able to find a lot of good information on here about gardening (I'm a newbie). Although, I wasn't sure where to post this question, I thought here would be a good start.
My family and I moved to a smaller town about 3 years ago, just north of Vancouver, WA. We love the are very much. When we first moved, the yard had brush, weed and grass that were as tall (if not, almost) as my husband, he's 6'2. I've been, slowly, creating small flower beds in front of the house. It needs to be done better, but plants are doing well.
The house sits on a small lot and on one side of the house, there's an eye-sore of a tree fort (w/o the tree) and below it , the previous owners covered the ground with river rocks. My problem is, I have Ophidiophobia or an extreme fear of snakes: tiny snakes, medium snakes, big snakes, garden snakes, poisonous snakes, dead or alive, or even the skin that they shed. It doesn't matter. I'm terrified of them! Unfortunately, the rocky areas of the yard are where they hang out to "sun bathe" and even sometimes around my plants, too. This has caused me to NOT want to go and take care of my plants, sometimes, or before I do, I take a step stool or a ladder, stand on it and poke the ground with a long stick and "stir" the area to scare them away before they scare me to death.
To most people, they think this is not much of a problem. However, until I find help with a professional (with this phobia), I need to get rid of the snakes around my yard, or at least, make them go somewhere else.
I've tried shoveling the rocks (they're not pebbles) thinking I could move them into a pile and maybe advertise to give them away, I found out it's, at least, 4 inches deep. Would it be all right to just pour cement or concrete onto it? It's against the side of my house and I thought I could just turn it into a sitting area with a few potted plants around. Any ideas?
